The elimination of rodents, such as mice and rats, and crawling insect pests, such as cockroaches, from living areas and livestock barns is highly desirable. A wide variety of methods to trap or poison rodents have been developed in the past. A most common type of trap used for trapping mice and small rats is in the form of a trigger-released spring trap which smashes the back or neck of the rodent upon release. These traps are reuseable, but the removal of the trapped rodent is distasteful to many persons. In addition, spring traps of this type pose a real threat of injury to domestic pets and small children. Consequently, their use is generally restricted to places where such pets and children do not have access.
Another approach which is commonly used to eliminate rodents is to spread posioned bait in areas which are known to be frequented by the rodents. As with the spring trap, however, the use of poisoned bait must be carefully controlled to prevent access to the bait by small children or pets to prevent serious harm from unwanted contact with the poisons. Another disadvantage of using poisons or poisoned bait is that the rodents do not die instantly, but tend to crawl into inaccessible places to hide where they ultimately die. The bodies then decay and produce an extremely offensive odor which frequently cannot be eliminated because of the inaccessibility of the location in which the rodent has died.
Other efforts to trap and kill undesirable rodents have led to the use of reuseable traps having a sealed chamber which closes upon entry of the rodent into the trap to thereafter suffocate the rodent. After the suffocation is complete, the rodent may be removed from the trap and it then may be reused. While traps of this type do not create any health hazzard to pets or children, the relative complexity of the trap and, again, the necessity of removing the rodent from it for reuse has significantly limited the commerical application and use of such traps.
In recent years, various types of tacky resins which retain a fairly consistent degree of tackiness over a long storage period have been employed in the development of rodent and insect traps with a fairly high degree of success. Such traps, when employed as rodent traps, generally utilize a layer of the tacky glue-like resin on the floor of the trap, with some provision for enticing the rodent into the trap. Once the rodent steps onto the tacky glue-like material, it becomes entrapped in it and subsequently dies. The entire trap then may be disposed of or a provision is sometimes made for simply removing the floor of the trap containing the glue-like resin and the entrapped rodent from the trap. A new floor then is put in place for reuse of the trap.
In its simplest form, a sticky glue trap comprises an open tray with the glue-like material placed in it. A trap of this type then is placed along a wall or baseboard in an area known to be frequented by mice or rats. During the night when the mice or rats are running along the wall, they run onto the surface of the trap and become caught. They die within a short period of time and the trap containing the rodent then may be disposed. As with many of the other traps mentioned above, the disposal is often quite unpleasant; because the dead rodent is in full view during the disposal of the trap and rodent.
A variety of traps with sticky glue or tacky resin floors in them for entrapping rodents within an enclosure also have been developed in the past. Three such traps are disclosed in the patents to Otterson, U.S. Pat. No. 4,244,134, Pearsall, U.S. Pat. No. 3,398,478, and Hughes, U.S. Pat. No. 2,962,836. The Otterson patent discloses a variety of shapes of open-ended housings with a sticky floor located in a central area of the housings to entrap rodents which run through the housing. Once the rodents engage the sticky floor they become caught in it and subsequently die. The entire trap then may be disposed. The open ends, however, do not permit concealment of the trapped rodent during the disposal of the trap; so that the unpleasant sight of the dead rodent still is present during the picking up and removal of the trap.
The trap disclosed in the Hughes patent is subject to all of the disadvantages, insofar as the removal and disposal of entrapped rodents is concerned, as are present in the open tray glue traps which have been discussed previously. In Hughes, a number of sticky floor bases are stacked upon one another with a removable cover placed over the entire stack. Whenever a rodent becomes entrapped on the top layer or top floor, the cover is removed and the floor with the entrapped rodent on it is lifted off and thrown away. The rodent is in full view during this disposal operations; so that the trap is quite similar with respect to this use as the open tray type of trap.
The Pearsall patent is a snare in the form of a tubular member flattened on its bottom to provide an enclosed pathway. The tube may be of a variety of cross sectional configurations. It is dimensioned to vary in accordance with the size of the rodents to be entrapped and has a width which is considerably less than the length of the rodent but greater than the rodent's width. This is done to permit free movement of the rodent along the pathway which has no adhesive or glue on it. The walls of the tube, however, are coated internally with an adhesive. Bait is placed at the closed end of the tube; so that an unimpeded pathway to the bait adjacent the closed end is provided. After the rodent has entered the snare and has reached the bait end, it becomes entrapped in the adhesive on the walls of the trap when it turns around to leave. Consequently, the rodent is caught adjacent the closed end of the tube; and the entire snare and rodent may be disposed of in any suitable manner. The relatively narrow confines of the Pearsall snare which must be used to ensure that the rodent is caught when it turns around to leave may in many cases serve as a warning or a caution to the rodent which may make it reluctant to enter the trap. Furthermore, the tubes must be dimensioned in accordance with the various sizes of the rodents to be trapped; and a small rodent conceivably can reach the bait and leave a large tube without becoming trapped.
Another type of rodent trap using a rubberized glue or similar sticky surface on the floor of the trap is disclosed in the patent to Hill, U.S. Pat. No. 4,161,079. The trap of the Hill patent, like various others of the traps described above, is an open-ended housing with a floor covered with tacky glue material. In Hill, not only is the end open, but slits or viewing windows are provided in the top cover of the trap to permit inspection to see whether a rodent is entrapped therein. The structure of the Hill trap is a multipart structure which causes it to be relatively expensive for a disposable trap. This, in many applications, would constitute a limitation on the extensive use of such a trap as disclosed in this patent.
Various types of cockroach traps also have been employed in the past utilizing a sticky glue floor material for entrapping the insects for subsequent disposal. Traps of this nature, either in the form of an open sheet or open-ended boxes, are disclosed in the patents to Nishimura, U.S. Pat. No. 3,913,259, Hall, U.S. Pat. No. 4,208,828, and Carr, U.S. Pat. No. 3,908,302. Because of the relatively small size of roaches, it is possible to produce open-ended roach traps with a sticky floor base located inside the trap which are not nearly as disagreeable to dispose of as is the case of the open-ended rodent traps typified by the patents discussed above. The roach traps, however, are of interest since some of the same general overall features of construction used in rodent traps are also employed in the roach traps.
In view of the foregoing, it is desirable to employ the concept of a sticky glue trap for capturing rodents, such as mice and rats, which does not have the disadvantages of the various prior art devices mentioned above. For example, such a trap should be simple and easy to manufacture. It should not require controlled dimensions and a provision should be made for permitting disposal of the trap without subjecting the person making such a disposal to the objectionable viewing of the entrapped rodent.